Safi Airways Co. ( ps, صافي هوايي شرکت; fa, خطوط هوایی صافی) was the first and largest privately owned

airline An airline is a company that provides air transport services for traveling passengers and freight. Airlines use aircraft to supply these services and may form partnerships or alliances with other airlines for codeshare agreements, in wh ...

from

Afghanistan Afghanistan, officially the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan,; prs, امارت اسلامی افغانستان is a landlocked country located at the crossroads of Central Asia and South Asia. Referred to as the Heart of Asia, it is bordere ...

. The airline had its headquarters in

Shahr-e-Naw Shahr-e Naw ( ps, شهر نو; prs, شهرنو), also spelled Share Naw, Shahre Naow or Shari Naw, is an affluent neighborhood in the northwestern section of Kabul, Afghanistan. It is a downtown commercial area housing most of the bigger building ...

Kabul Kabul (; ps, , ; , ) is the capital and largest city of Afghanistan. Located in the eastern half of the country, it is also a municipality, forming part of the Kabul Province; it is administratively divided into 22 municipal districts. Acco ...

, Afghanistan, an administrative office in the

Dubai Airport Free Zone Dubai Airport Freezone (commonly abbreviated as DAFZ) is a free economic zone in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, providing company formation and business setup services in Dubai. DAFZ enables the following types of company formations:  ...

History

Safi Airways has been founded as a subsidiary of the Safi Group and in 2006 by its chairman and CEO, Ghulam Hazrat Safi. On 15 June 2009, Safi Airways commenced operations between the Afghan capital,

, and

Frankfurt Airport Frankfurt Airport (; german: link=no, Flughafen Frankfurt Main , also known as ''Rhein-Main-Flughafen'') is a major international airport located in Frankfurt, the fifth-largest city of Germany and one of the world's leading financial centres ...

Germany Germany,, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It is the second most populous country in Europe after Russia, and the most populous member state of the European Union. Germany is situated betwe ...

. This service was however suspended on 24 November 2010 due to an EU ban barring all Afghan carriers from flying into Europe and did since never resume. On 5 November 2009, Safi Airways took delivery of a pre-owned

Airbus A340-300 The Airbus A340 is a long-range, wide-body passenger airliner that was developed and produced by Airbus. In the mid-1970s, Airbus conceived several derivatives of the A300, its first airliner, and developed the A340 quadjet in parallel wit ...

, which was phased out after suspension of the Frankfurt route due to the EU ban. In 2011, Safi Airways replaced their

Boeing 737-300 The Boeing 737 Classic is a series of narrow-body airliners produced by Boeing Commercial Airplanes, the second generation of the Boeing 737 series of aircraft. Development began in 1979 and the first variant, the 737-300, first flew in Februa ...

aircraft with Airbus A32x aircraft. They intended to acquire an

Airbus A330 The Airbus A330 is a wide-body aircraft developed and produced by Airbus. Airbus conceived several derivatives of the A300, its first airliner in the mid-1970s. Then the company began development on the A330 twinjet in parallel with the A340 ...

for long haul routes in 2016 which however did not take place. Since February 2012, Safi Airways is the first Afghan airline to operate in compliance with

European Aviation Safety Agency The European Union Aviation Safety Agency (EASA) is an agency of the European Union (EU) with responsibility for civil aviation safety. It carries out certification, regulation and standardisation and also performs investigation and monito ...

(EASA) requirements,

IOSA The IATA Operational Safety Audit (IOSA) programme is an internationally recognised and accepted evaluation system designed to assess the operational management and control systems of an airline. IOSA uses internationally recognised quality audit ...

( IATA Operational Safety Audit) and ICAO (International Civil Aviation Organization). 2015 Safi Airways featured Bahari Ibaadat Miss Afghanistan 2014 in their Inflight magazine On 5 September 2016, Afghan authorities forced Safi Airways to suspend all operations over unpaid debt and disbanding.

Destinations

As of September 2018, Safi Airways served the following destinations:

Fleet

Current fleet

As of October 2016, the Safi Airways fleet consisted of the following aircraft:

Former fleet

Safi Airways previously operated the following aircraft:

References

External links

Official website
{{DEFAULTSORT:Safi Airways Airlines formerly banned in the European Union Defunct airlines of Afghanistan Airlines established in 2006 Airlines disestablished in 2018 2006 establishments in Afghanistan 2010s disestablishments in Afghanistan